Title: A new approach to measuring the liveability of cities: the Global Liveable Cities Index

Authors: Tan Khee Giap; Woo Wing Thye; Grace Aw

Addresses: Asia Competitiveness Institute, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, 469A Bukit Timah Road, Level 2 Wing A, 259770, Singapore ' Economics Department, University of California, One Shields Avenue, Davis, California 956161, USA ' Mathematics and Statistics Department, Curtin University, Kent Street, Bentley 6102, Australia

Abstract: This paper advocates a new measure of liveability - the Global Liveable Cities Index (GLCI) - to rank the world's major cities. The GLCI advances the measurement of the 'liveability' construct by taking into account the multidimensional sensibility of diverse groups of ordinary persons across 64 cities. The paper also compares the GLCI with six well known city indices from the literature and finds that the GLCI performs as a relevant liveability indicator for diverse groups of ordinary persons. In addition, the paper conducts policy simulations to find that city planners interested in attracting talent of a given personality type can invest in areas with low scores in the GLCI.

Keywords: economic competitiveness; liveability indicators; city benchmarking; major cities; city indices; city planning; urban planning.

DOI: 10.1504/WRSTSD.2014.065677

World Review of Science, Technology and Sustainable Development, 2014 Vol.11 No.2, pp.176 - 196

Received: 17 Sep 2013
Accepted: 14 May 2014

Published online: 25 Nov 2014 *

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